Central Asia Falling Apart, Literally -- Report

If you’re reading this blog in Central Asia, you might plug in your laptop and charge your battery-powered lamps before proceeding. You never know when the electricity will be gone for good.

"Central Asia: Decay and Decline," a bleak new report from the International Crisis Group (ICG), says Central Asia’s human and technological infrastructure is nearing collapse, threatening the region with more political instability. Not just buildings, roads and power plants are at risk of falling apart; teachers and doctors are woefully undertrained, underpaid, and neglected by donor-dependent leaders more interested in personal gain than in helping their people.

Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan, the region’s two poorest countries, face the “increasingly likely prospect of catastrophic systemic collapse,” the wide-ranging report says, tracing most problems to the region’s endemic and mind-boggling graft.